Seventh Congress1935

I. Dimitrov’s Report on the United Front: The Struggle against Fascism and War

2 August 1935

(Excerpt)

The Anti-Imperialist United Front

In connection with the changed international and internal situation,
exceptional importance attaches in all colonial countries and
semi-colonies to the question of the anti-imperialist united front.

In forming a wide anti-imperialist united front of struggle in the
colonies and semi-colonies, it is necessary above all to recognise the
variety of conditions in which the anti-imperialist struggle of the
masses is proceeding, the varying degrees of maturity of the
national-liberation movement, the role of the proletariat within it and
the influence of the communist party over the broad masses.

In Brazil the problem differs from that in India, China, etc. In
Brazil the Communist Party, having laid a correct foundation for the
development of the united anti-imperialist front by the establishment
of the National Liberation Alliance, has to make every effort to extend
further this front by drawing into it first and foremost the many
millions of the peasantry, leading up to the formation of units of a
people’s revolutionary army, completely devoted to the revolution, and
to the establishment of the rule of the National Liberation Alliance.

In India the communists have to support, extend and participate in
all anti-imperialist mass activities, not excluding those which are
under national-reformist leadership. While maintaining their political
and organisational independence, they must carry on active work inside
the organisations which take part in the Indian National Congress,
facilitating the process of crystallisation of a national-revolutionary
wing among them, for the purpose of further developing the
national-liberation movement of the Indian people against British
imperialism.

In China, where the people’s movement has already led to the
formation of soviet districts over a considerable territory of the
country and to the organisation of a powerful Red Army, the predatory
attack of Japanese imperialism and the treason of the Nanking
government have brought into jeopardy the national existence of the
great Chinese people. Only the Chinese soviets can act as a unifying
centre in the struggle against the enslavement and partition of China
by the imperialists, as a unifying centre which will rally all
anti-imperialist forces for the national defence of the Chinese people.

We therefore approve of the initiative taken by our courageous
brother party of China in the creation of a most extensive
anti-imperialist united front against Japanese imperialism and its
Chinese agents, jointly with all those organised forces existing on the
territory of China which are ready to wage a real struggle for the
salvation of their country and their people. I am sure that I express
the sentiments and thoughts of our entire congress if I state that we
send our warmest fraternal greetings, in the name of the revolutionary
proletariat of the whole world, to all the soviets of China, to the
Chinese revolutionary people. We send our ardent fraternal greetings to
the heroic Red Army of China, tried in a thousand battles. And we
assure the Chinese people of our firm resolve to support its struggle
for its complete liberation from all imperialist robbers and their
Chinese henchmen.

II. Resolution on Fascism and the Unity of the Working Class

20 August 1935
(Excerpt)

V. The Anti-Imperialist People’s Front in the Colonial Countries

In the colonial and semi-colonial countries, the most important task facing the communists consists in working to establish an anti-imperialist people’s front.
For this purpose it is necessary to draw the widest masses into the
national-liberation movement .against growing imperialist exploitation,
against cruel enslavement, for the driving out of the imperialists, for
the independence of the country; to take an active part in the mass
anti-imperialist movements headed by the national-reformists and strive
to bring about joint action with the national-revolutionary .and
national-reformist organisations on the basis of a definite
anti-imperialist platform.

In China, the extension of the Soviet movement and the strengthening
of the fighting power of the Red Army must be combined with the
development of the people’s anti-imperialist movement all over the
country. This movement must be carried on under the slogan of the
national-revolutionary struggle of the armed people against the
imperialist enslavers, in the first place against Japanese imperialism
and its Chinese servitors. The soviets must become the rallying centre
for the entire Chinese people in its struggle for emancipation.

In the interests of its own struggle for emancipation, the
proletariat of the imperialist countries must give its unstinted
support to the liberation struggle of the colonial and semi-colonial
peoples against the imperialist pirates.

(Ibid., 119)

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